In return, Dr. Balling has done whatever he could to cast doubts on the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change. For example, in 1997 he was arguing “the planet has actually cooled over the past few decades.” His arguments have moderated somewhat since that time, but are no more accurate. You can find a full debunk of the misleading scientific arguments in Dr. Balling’s recent article – cleverly titled “Inconvenient Truths Indeed” – below.

BALLING: “Gore discusses glacial and snowpack retreats atop Kenya’s Mt. Kilimanjaro, implying that human induced global warming is to blame. But Gore fails to mention that the snows of Kilimanjaro have been retreating for more than 100 years, largely due to declining atmospheric moisture, not global warming.”

BALLING: “Many of Gore’s conclusions are based on the ‘Hockey Stick’ that shows near constant global temperatures for 1,000 years with a sharp increase in temperature from 1900 onward. The record Gore chooses in the film completely wipes out the Medieval Warm Period of 1,000 years ago and Little Ice Age that started 500 years ago and ended just over 100 years ago.”

THE FACTS: First, as Dr. Balling acknowledges, Gore does discuss the “Medieval Warm Period” and other temperature fluctuations in the last thousands years. Gore simply illustrates that these changes were fundamentally different than what has occurred at the end of the 20th century. Scientific studies back this up. Realclimate.org explains, “Nearly a dozen model-based and proxy-based reconstructions of Northern Hemisphere mean temperature by different groups all suggest that late 20th century warmth is anomalous in a long-term (multi-century to millennial) context.”

BALLING: “You will certainly not be surprised to see Katrina, other hurricanes, tornadoes, flash floods, and many types of severe weather events linked by Gore to global warming. However, if one took the time to read the downloadable ‘Summary for Policymakers’ in the latest report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), one would learn that “No systematic changes in the frequency of tornadoes, thunder days, or hail events are evident in the limited areas analysed.”

DR. BALLING: “Gore claims that sea level rise could drown the Pacific islands, Florida, major cities the world over, and the 9/11 Memorial in New York City. No mention is made of the fact that sea level has been rising at a rate of 1.8 mm per year for the past 8,000 years; the IPCC notes that “No significant acceleration in the rate of sea level rise during the 20th century has been detected.”

THE FACTS: The quote cited by Dr. Balling continues :”This is not inconsistent with model results [predicting accelerating sea levels] due to the possibility of compensating factors and the limited data.” The IPCC study also notes that over the last 3,000 years, sea levels have increased “at an average rate of 0.1 to 0.2 mm/yr” which is “about one tenth of that occurring during the 20th century.” Moreover, “The last time the planet may have been a degree or so warmer than today (about 120,000 years ago), sea level was around 5 to 6 meters higher.”

Like ThinkProgress on Facebook

By clicking and submitting a comment I acknowledge the ThinkProgress Privacy Policy and agree to the ThinkProgress Terms of Use. I understand that my comments are also being governed by Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, or Hotmail’s Terms of Use and Privacy Policies as applicable, which can be found here.